September 19: Anatomy of a Metro Police Sting: Operation Decoy Dummy

Date: September 19, 2017

Time: 7 p.m.

Cost: Free for Museum Members or with admission

Metro Police get creative to capture man believed responsible for two murders in downtown Las Vegas.

Join us to hear the gripping and innovative story of how Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department combined old-fashioned Sherlock Holmes sleuthing with innovative policing and high-tech surveillance to catch a murder suspect.

A CPR dummy used in the decoy sting also will be on display as part of the panel discussion, set for Tuesday, September 19, at 7 p.m.

The panel will include Metro Police Captain Andrew Walsh, supervisor of the Downtown Area Command; Marc DiGiacomo, chief deputy district attorney; and Homicide Detective Ryan Jaeger as well as the Museum’s Senior Director of Content Geoff Schumacher as moderator.

After two homeless men were murdered, Metro was stumped. They had no suspects. So they came up with a creative, innovative and yet classic decoy sting operation.

Walsh and his squad dressed up a CPR dummy, wrapped it in blankets and placed it in a sleeping position in the same area where the murders occurred. They watched the dummy for three weeks and nothing happened.

“Everybody thought I was completely crazy,” Walsh recalls.

Surveillance cameras eventually captured a man who walked up to the dummy and began attacking it with a hammer. Shane Schindler, 30, later pleaded guilty to attempted murder and was sentenced to 8 to 20 years in prison.

The event will be followed by a question-and-answer session.

Photos courtesy of the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

Panelists

Marc DiGiacomo  

Marc DiGiacomo

After graduating from law school in New York, DiGiacomo interned with the office of the Clark County District Attorney, which led to a position as a Deputy District Attorney on the Domestic Violence Unit. He is currently a prosecutor on the Major Violator’s Unit and has handled 88 jury trials, 57 of which were homicides.

Andrew Walsh  

Andrew Walsh

Andrew Walsh served as a New York City police officer from 1992-1998 before joining the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department in 1998. During his years with Metro, he has served as field training officer, academy training officer, public information officer and in Internal Affairs. He has been a captain since January of 2015, assigned to the Downtown Area Command.

Ryan Jeager  

Ryan Jeager

Ryan Jeager has been an officer with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department for over 19 years and currently is assigned to the homicide section. He has also served as a uniformed patrol officer and traffic officer assigned to investigate traffic accidents. During more than seven years with the sex crimes investigation unit, he was responsible for investigation juvenile sex abuse and sexually motivated crimes. He also has served with the Office of Internal Over site, Force Investigation Team.